Southern Missouri Off Road Ranch

We got the opportunity to spend a few days at the Southern Missouri Off Road Ranch, or SMORR as most people know it, is located 5 miles South of Seymour Missouri along highway K. Our group was greeted by Kayla who managed to arrange for our entire group to have adjoining campsites. We had 6 Jeeps with us this and this was made even more amazing since the national Jeep Scrambler club was also at the park with 39 CJ-8's. Brandon has recently installed a nice shower house  and a small café. He will also do what he can to get your broken rig off the trail and try to help you get it fixed and back out for another run.

Located on 940 acres, the trails are marked well and rated from 1 to 5 with 5 being the most difficult. The trail ratings are pretty accurate and on par with other parks across the country. When I mention a trail, it's rating will follow in parenthesis. Trail map can be downloaded here. We started the day off with Pee Wee's Crossing (2), which is a nice easy trail along a stream bed. It was fairly dry this day, but we still hit some water that was never deeper than about six inches. I would imagine this changes after a good rain. Pee Wee's travels along the North side of the park and is a nice alternative to Ranch Road (1) to get from one side of the park to the other. You can see Pee Wee's at the beginning of the Day One video. Trails like the aptly Rocker Knocker (4) and Disturbed (4) provided some challenges for our rigs, while  Adventure Hill (5) was downright abusive. One in our group did manage to make it up the waterfall which is along Rock Knocker & Rattler (5). You can see that amazing feat in the 2nd day video below.


Trails in the Day One video include Pee Wee's Crossing, & Larry's Hill (4) around the 4 minute mark.



Trails in the Day Two video start with Rocker Knocker leading up to the Waterfall around the one minute mark, a brief glimpse of Doe Skid (4) is at 2:30, Rocky Road (4) is at the three minute mark.

Qualifying Order for 2012 King of the Hammers

Here's the link for the qualifying order for the 2012 King of the Hammers race.

For the first time the starting order will be determined by a qualifying race. More than seventy last chance qualifiers will be competing for one of the twenty remaining spots, and the 90 pre-qualified racers will be competing for their starting positions. Follow the link for the list of drivers and the day they will be competing.

http://ultra4racing.com/uncategorized/2012-4wheel-parts-qualifying-rounds-starting-order/

2012 Wrangler wins best the ALG residual value award

ALG (the industry benchmark for residual values and depreciation data) has awarded the 2012 Jeep Wrangler with the best residual value for Best Compact Utility Vehicle.  This is awarded to the vehicles that are expected to retain the highest percentage of their original price after three years.  The 2012 Wrangler has also been awarded Kelley Blue Book's "Best Resale Value Award: 'Top 10' & 'Compact Utility Vehicle," Petersen's Off Road "4x4 Of The Year," 2011 SEMA's "Hottest 4x4 SUV," Active Lifestyle Vehicle's "Best Value Off_Road," and the Texas Auto Writers Association's "Mid-Size SUV of Texas."

ALG is based in Santa Barbara California and publishes the Automotive Lease Guide and is one of the leading providers of data and consulting services to the automotive industry.

source:
Chrysler Media Release

The ultimate expedition vehicles.

Okay, so the is new news.  But I think it's timely news since this particular truck belongs to Jesse James and it's the vehicle he will be taking to the Baja 1000 next weekend as his support truck.  This particular truck, called the UXV-550, started life as a Ford F-550.  It has been converted by Global Expedition Vehicles in Nixa Missouri. 

This is only one example of the quality trucks they build.  Check out their website for more including the:

Safari Extreme

Global Traveler

Survival Basics Model